


difference

by poor_sickies



Series: tumblr prompt fills [5]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst, Body Horror, Body Modification, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-11
Updated: 2019-09-11
Packaged: 2020-10-14 20:27:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,380
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20606807
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/poor_sickies/pseuds/poor_sickies
Summary: Pidge really hopes this isn’t permanent.





	difference

Matt punches the table.

“What do you mean?” He asks, exasperated, once again. “What did they do to her?”

“Matt.”

Shiro walks closer and places a hand in his shoulder. His face is serious and determined, but his eyes are pleading.

“I know you are worried. We all are. But we’re all trying our best here.”

Matt steps away from Shiro’s grasp, shaking his head fiercely. “I’m just trying to understand, will you tell me already?”

Shiro sighs. He hadn’t reacted this badly when they had sent the distress signal from the Castle, just three days before, to Matt’s rebel base. He had gotten to them three hours later, focused and level headed, asking for any information they had.

Pidge had been taken suddenly, during a routine recon mission. The green lion hadn’t been able to find her, and the way she had disappeared, no one could really tell where she was.

Matt had taken to speak with the locals, trying to gather any info to find his sister, and sleep didn’t seem to be an issue anymore. Not that anyone else was actually sleeping either.

After contacting the Blade of Marmora, Keith had left their base to join the search for the green paladin, and in the end, it was thanks to the Riukians and the database at Marmora that Voltron was able to find a small Galra base, gravitating around a moon a few planets away.

Matt had wanted to be the one on the ground, breaking in to get her, but Shiro hadn’t let him. Matt had been close to losing his cool there, but even he could understand that without need for air support, the paladins were more useful on the ground.

He had stayed at the Castle, with Coran, pacing back and forth at the bridge once Pidge was retrieved.

So no one can really blame him for his outburst, after three days of no sleeping and relentlessly searching for Pidge, exhausted, worried and stressed. Especially not after Coran says she had been “experimented on”.

“She’s at the infirmary right now,” Coran explains calmly, like he’s walking on eggshells. “She’s stable, and will most likely make a full recovery.”

Matt exhales, patience thinning again. “But..?”

“When we found her,” Shiro says solemnly, “she was in one of their labs. With the druids.”

“They were… it is possible that they were attempting some kind of species mix,” Coran explains with a pained look. “It seems they were using a Balmeran specimen, or a similar race.”

“I want to see her.”

Shiro nods. Matt should really be resting after all of this, and preparing himself for the state he’s about to see Pidge in. But Shiro knows it’s worthless to try, and he can’t blame him.

“She’s in a cryopod now. She wasn’t badly injured, so she should be out in a few hours.”

The cryopod room is empty and cold, and Matt all but runs inside.

Pidge looks small and frail in the white cryopod suit, eyes closed and overgrown hair touching her shoulders. Matt doesn’t notice right away, but when he does, he briefly wonders how he missed it.

On each side of her lower jaw sit two conical horns, breaking through her skin.

The pod is supposed to repair the tissues, but Matt can understand immediately that Pidge’s skin isn’t quite enough to stretch over the new structures. So it remains a sort of open wound, without any blood, but with the skin still broken around the two new additions.

It looks alien.

When he’s able to look away, he notices the bruises around her eyes, and worse, her hands.

Her once delicate fingers are now broken and jagged, like the bone sprouted from itself, with large bumps at the knuckles. Her nails are long and thick, like claws, and dark like dirt.

“Come on, Matt. Hey. Hey, stay with me, okay?”

He’s hyperventilating, his lungs aren’t getting enough air. He feels lightheaded and dizzy, and clumsily reaches for the strong arms around his shoulders, the only thing keeping him upright.

“Okay, let’s get you sitting down, yeah?

Shiro leads him to the chairs in the center of the room, and helps him down, before kneeling in front of him, placing his hands on top of his knees.

“Coran and Hunk are doing their best to find a way to reverse it, alright? And from what he said, the chances aren’t bad. We’ll deal with this together.”

Matt shakes and trembles, letting out short sobs into his hands. He wants to punch whoever did this. To slice a hole in their stomach until they have no blood left to drip. He wants to curl up in a ball and forget this, too.

“They… Katie… They mutilated her-”

“I know, Matt.” Shiro rubs circles on his back, trying to calm him down. “We took care of them.”

“Good,” Matt says, low and hurt and angry. He stands up suddenly, startling Shiro, and walks briskly to the door.

“What - Matt! Where are you going?”

Shiro runs after him, confused.

“I’m gonna find a way to get her back to normal. She won’t have to live with this.”

“Matt, please. We don’t-” Shiro stops himself. “We can’t be sure this is -”

“You said!” Matt accuses, staring straight into Shiro’s eyes. “There’s a good chance. I’ll make sure of it.”

He storms off again, slower, and this time, Shiro is able to catch up.

“Don’t you think you should get some rest first? Hunk and Coran are working on it, right now. You’re a mess, Matt. You need some sleep.”

Matt’s face falls. He knows Shiro is right. His brain is running marathons, trying to process all of this.

Katie was kidnapped, and then used as a lab rat, for almost three days. The physical effects were evident, and no cryopod could heal it. It had been shocking enough for him and the others, he can only imagine how she felt.

And the mental repercussions.

They hadn’t cut off a limb, like they had done to Shiro. But it’s still a change, and by no means small.

“You won’t be able to help anyone in that state.” Shiro steps closer, and slowly pulls him into a hug.

The close contact and warmth bring a sudden urge to start crying again, but he fights back agaisnt it.

“I’ll stay here with her, Matt. She won’t be alone. Just go get some rest, and we’ll deal with everything after she’s woken up, okay?”

Going to bed feels wrong somehow. How could he, when there isn’t even a solution in sight? He’s one of the people that can actually eventually find something that will help, but Shiro isn’t being unreasonable.

“I’ll take a nap,” he croaks out, weakly. “But promise me you’ll wake me when she’s up.”

“I promise,” Shiro nods.

*

The last thing she remembers, before Keith’s arms let go of her to put her in the cryopod, is the aching sensation of something thick and strange running through her veins, and the violent pains in her hands and jaw.

And when she stumbles out of the pod, it’s still there. Duller and colder, but she recognizes it.

“Easy,” Shiro steadies her with an arm around her waist. She tries to grab onto him, but the second she curls up her fingers, she instantly recoils in pain.

“Ow! What is - what happened?”

When the black dots disappear from her vision, she stares at her own left hand, still halfway through her shoulder and Shiro’s bicep.

“N-no… no, no, no, where is my hand, I-”

Talking seems to take a bit of an effort too, pain radiating from two specific points on her lower jaw.

Shiro holds her tighter, trying to steady her. “Pidge, just calm down. You’re okay-”

“My hands!” She yells exasperated, glaring at Shiro. “S-Shiro - what - the pod…”

The memories come back to her slowly. She hadn’t seen it before, but she had felt the changes then. Then it hits her - the pod hasn’t fixed anything.

She’s stuck like this. Her body has been altered, forever, and there’s nothing she can do to get it back.

Pidge isn’t able to warn Shiro before turning her face away and throwing up all over the floor.

“Damnit… someone get Matt!”


End file.
